[ale] Off topic - And now, Arizona

Sat Jul 10 22:54:12 EDT 2010

Jim,

SURELY you don't think Social (in)Security is a better run program? Also,
much but not all of Detroit's problems can be laid on (mis)management. They
are also in bed with the unions. The old UAW game of strike against the
weakest of the three sisters to get the deal they wanted and then threaten
the other two to sign the same contract terms (not altogether unlike "making
them an offer they couldn't refuse" in the Godfather sense) is also largely
to blame for the mess. You gotta agree that paying people 90% of their
normal salary while they are laid off is a bit ridiculous from a business
standpoint. As one who has worked for a small [unintentionally non-profit]
computer company for >20 yrs, that is hanging on by a thread, I can tell you
"up close and personal" that if a company doesn't make a profit, ultimately
nobody has a job. Profit is not evil and certainly not all management is
evil-greedy. If businesses aren't profitable, govt revenues fall. Govt
doesn't produce, but is parasitic and if the host isn't healthy neither is
the parasite.

May main point is there is absolutely no reason to think that govt will be
any less "greedy" cause it is made up of people and "folks is folks" they
come in good and bad in all colors and stratas of society. At least business
has to answer to share holders and bankers. Bureaucrats are essentially
unaccountable to anybody and are dis-incentivised to be efficient and
productive (spend all your budget every year and get more, fail to do so and
your budget gets cut, never "solve" any problems you are addressing or you
will be out of a job). How many $B have we spent on the "War on Poverty" and
"The Great Society" since instituted by LBJ and where is the poverty rate
now, basically the same. Govt sponsored fatherless households have lead to
all manner of black on black crime in particular in addition to many other
social ills.

Seems to me Shakespeare had it right in Julius Caesar with the line that
goes pretty much like: "The fault dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in
ourselves." The founding fathers understood this and that is why they
established checks and balances with the 3 branches of govt. But who could
have foreseen the bureaucracies we now have running the bloated mess? How
many new ones has Obama created just with the so called health care reform,
and they're going to hire what was it 12,000 or 17,000 new IRS agents to
enforce the penalty collection for all those who opt not to purchase the
mandated health care plan because the penalty cost is less than the
coverage? That is a back door tax in my book!

I can't say that I have any answers to the problems we currently face, but I
am convinced that MORE govt and govt spending is NOT the right solution. You
can't "spend yourself rich" and as Thatcher(?) said, the problem with
socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money. We're
seeing that in Greece, GB, Spain and Portugal now and the USA,
unfortunately, isn't all that far behind.

GC

On Sat, Jul 10, 2010 at 9:02 PM, Jim Kinney <jim.kinney at gmail.com> wrote:

> High.What the worker makes is far less. Even adding in the benefits it was
> high. However, doing the accounting trick of costing the retirement out to
> the current work force, then you get above $50/hr.
>
> But the retirement fund was a combination of money withheld from the
> employees and money set aside by the company that was supposed to be
> invested and available after retirement. But as per usual, the withheld
> portion was not invested and the set aside funds never materialized so the
> US automakers are reliant on the current workforce to pay for the retirement
> of the prior workforce.'
>
> Oh. Isn't that sort of like corporate taxation/socialism? WE take from YOU
> to fund the promises WE made to THEM but WE always get paid on time and get
> paid damn nicely to leave.
>
> gaaahhhh..... greedy people suck.......
>
> Personally, I think most corps have squandered the retirement funds they
> are contractually obligated to pay.
>
> On Sat, Jul 10, 2010 at 4:36 PM, Greg Freemyer <greg.freemyer at gmail.com>wrote:
>
>> On Sat, Jul 10, 2010 at 2:21 PM, Jim Kinney <jim.kinney at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> >
>> > On Sat, Jul 10, 2010 at 1:53 PM, Greg Freemyer <greg.freemyer at gmail.com
>> >
>> > wrote:
>> >>
>> >> On Sat, Jul 10, 2010 at 1:24 PM, Jeff Hubbs <jhubbslist at att.net>
>> wrote:
>> >> >  Whenever someone around me gets all wound up about illegals, I ask
>> >> > them if they're ready for $10/lb strawberries and chicken more
>> expensive
>> >> > than lobster.
>> >>
>> >> I seriously doubt chicken has more than a $2 of labor per chicken.
>> >> (More if its not whole.)
>> >>
>> >> Most of the process including feeding is highly automated, and a fast
>> >> processing line for whole chickens (not cut-up) can handle
>> >> 100/chickens a minute, so the butchering is very efficient.  (Max of
>> >> 50 or so people on that sort of line, so that works out to about 30
>> >> man-seconds per chicken to kill it, de-feather, etc.)
>> >>
>> >> It's a very low-margin business, so they want as cheap a labor as they
>> >> can get, but even if they had to pay $15/hr it would not be too
>> >> expensive to eat.
>> >>
>> >> Now paying car factory union rates of $50/hr would have a bigger
>> >> impact, but still not lobster prices.
>> >
>> > recheck the $50/hr.
>> > http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/11/24/opinion/main4630103.shtml
>> > and
>> > http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aRViSBJZq45k
>> >
>> > The $51/hr in the bloomberg article is pay + benefits.
>> >
>> > Important numbers are here:
>> >
>> > The Detroit-based automaker's current assembly workers get $31.75 an
>> hour in
>> > pay, including overtime and bonuses, and $19.25 in benefits, according
>> to an
>> > analysis by Laurie Harbour-Felax, president of Chicago-based Stout
>> Risius
>> > Ross Inc. Adding pensions and other retiree costs raises the total to
>> about
>> > $73.
>> >
>> > Toyota's U.S. workers cost about $47.25 an hour, including $31.50 in pay
>> and
>> > $15.75 in benefits, the study found. Toyota doesn't have additional
>> expenses
>> > for retirees because so few of its U.S. factory employees have reached
>> > retirement.
>>
>> So Jim, are you saying my $50/hr WAG (wild ass guess) was high or low.
>>  Looks like I was about right for Toyota and low from GM.  Either way,
>> I hope we never have to pay that kind of money for chicken processors.
>>
>> fyi: I interviewed a electronic technition working on Rockwell's
>> production line one time.  We wanted to hire a electronic tech to work
>> in our prototype area.  During the interview the questions got easier
>> and easier as we tried to figure out if the guy knew anything.  Even
>> Ohm's low was unknown to him.
>>
>> Turned out he was making good money ($25/hr iirc and this was 25 yrs
>> ago.)  His job was to stick a circuit board in a tester.  If the light
>> turned green, take it out and put it in the good pile.  If red, put it
>> in the bad pile.
>>
>> I was flabbergasted at the time.  (I was young and naive).
>>
>> Greg
>>
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>
>
>
> --
> --
> James P. Kinney III
> Actively in pursuit of Life, Liberty and Happiness
> Doing pretty well on all 3 pursuits
>
>   Faith is a cop-out. If the only way you can accept an assertion is by
> faith, then you are conceding that it can’t be taken on its own merits.
>     Dan Barker, "Losing Faith in Faith", 1992
>
>
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